Dark as Day by Charles Sheffield Page B

to explain to Kate days ago but had evaded yet again.
    He didn’t think she would understand— could understand. He had to live with it all the time, two hundred and fifty years of family tradition and obligation, invisible to anyone but pressing down on Alex’s shoulders far harder than Ganymede’s gravity.
    Ligon Industries dated back to Alonzo Ligon, the nineteenth-century tyrant who had built some of the first iron-hulled ships that sailed the oceans of Earth. Alex was a direct descendant, nine generations removed from Alonzo.
    And that might not be the worst of it. Since setting off for the meeting, Alex had been cursed with another thought. He had been reviewing in his mind’s eye yesterday’s image of his mother as it had appeared in the display, and thought he could detect some troubling elements.
    He came to the bronzed double doors with the discreet brass plate, LIGON INDUSTRIES; BY APPOINTMENT ONLY, and peered into the eye-level camera above the plate. His retinal pattern was recognized, and the great doors swung silently open. The Level Three Fax on duty said, “Welcome, Mr. Alex. The meeting has already begun, and it is in the chamber to your right.”
    Alex steeled himself and went straight in. The marble-topped oval table had sixteen positions, each with its own work station. Eleven seats were occupied. Alex stepped quietly across a deep carpet of living purple and green and sat down next to his mother. Lena Ligon nodded a greeting. The man at the end of the table did not nod, or change for a moment his tone of voice.
    “That phase of the work is concluded,” he said. “The Starseed is on its way, and a financial accounting must be made. The details are available to anyone here who wishes to examine them, but my summary is simple: Ligon Industries took a calculated risk in accepting a contract to mine helium-three from the atmosphere of Jupiter and deliver it into rendezvous orbit with the Starseed vessel. We also took a bath. At the time, I recommended against signing the contract, and it proves to have been a financial disaster.”
    Alex glanced around the table. Prosper Ligon was the ranking family member by virtue of seniority. No matter who was senior, however, Prosper Ligon’s conclusions on questions like this were not likely to be challenged. Alex’s great-uncle was the chief financial analyst and de facto head of the company, a lifelong bachelor and a celibate, slow, deliberate, and precise in thought and deed. Those thoughts and deeds excluded sexual activities of any kind. Although only in his mid-sixties, with his long face and yellowed teeth Prosper was easy to imagine in old age as a skinny and weathered donkey.
    His lifestyle and work habits were legendary. Rising at three, he ate a simple breakfast and proceeded at once to his office in a dark corner of the company’s corporate facility. There he sat at a cluttered desk and worked, through the day, through the evening, and on late into the night. No task appeared boring to him when it involved financial elements. Numbers were the donkey’s passion, and apparently numbers alone. It was rumored—and probably no more than rumor—that he disliked computers, and performed his voluminous calculations by hand. When he ate it was infrequently, alone, and in random amounts.
    “The contract provides an option,” Prosper went on, “to continue the work and collect the helium-3 needed to fuel Starseed-Two . That leaves us with a difficult decision.”
    Alex did his survey of the family members present. Around the table, to his left, were his mother Lena, then the two childless great-aunts, Cora and Agatha, and then Cousin Hector Ligon, with two empty chairs between him and Prosper Ligon. Two more empty seats lay on Prosper’s left. The other four places were occupied by girl cousins Juliana, Rezel, and Tanya, and in the place to Alex’s right Uncle Karolus sat scowling down at the table.
    “It’s obvious what we do,” Karolus growled.